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Topic: What is wrong with the idea... (Read 5463 times)

Hmm, where did the 8 frame box come from? I am comparing a 3 ten frame mediums to 2 ten frame deeps. Is my terminology wrong? I am new at this.

Acebird.... :? Did you look at Reply #10 :?

BEE HAPPY Jim 134 :)

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"Tell me and I'll forget,show me and I may remember,involve me and I'll understand" Chinese Proverb

"The farmer is the only man in our economy who buys everything at retail, sells everything at wholesale, and pays the freight both ways." John F. KennedyFranklin County Beekeepers Association MA. http://www.franklinmabeekeepers.org/

IMO they winter better in the eight frame box. It fits the cluster better and they leave less food behind and have less indecision about where to go. Up is really the only option.

Oh boy, now I have to admit how stupid I am. After running off at the mouth about 10 frames vs. 8 what we actually have is an 8 frame body and we winter over with two deeps.

Yes I did Jim.

So Michele, are you saying to winter over with 4 mediums or are the 4 mediums what you use in the summer and the one on top is considered the super for honey extraction? I am going back to my calculation where 3 mediums just about equals 2 deeps. It doesn’t matter much if we are talking about 8 or 10 frames.

IMO they winter better in the eight frame box. It fits the cluster better and they leave less food behind and have less indecision about where to go. Up is really the only option.

a very prominent beekeeper name Serge Labesque who teaches around here, uses follower boards in all his 10 frame hives. So when using those follower boards, which I do have in some of my hives, I end up with 8 frame mediums anyway. He is in agreement with Michael Bush that the cluster fits the 8 frames better. From my experience, well I don't really know, I just like the follower boards for ease of manipulation. I overwinter with 3 mediums, some 8 frames (follower boards) and some 10 frames and it all works out well.

This is very interesting because a 10 frame hive is more square (less rectangle). One dimension is a constant so going from 10 to 8 makes it more rectangular. The cluster being a sphere, suggest that there will be space on two of the sides but not the other two.

This discussion has been great. I thing I will go with all mediums for our next hive.

"Tell me and I'll forget,show me and I may remember,involve me and I'll understand" Chinese Proverb

"The farmer is the only man in our economy who buys everything at retail, sells everything at wholesale, and pays the freight both ways." John F. KennedyFranklin County Beekeepers Association MA. http://www.franklinmabeekeepers.org/

All right I will bite. You are using 9 frames plus 2 followers, how do you get them in? If you are going to squish down a 10 frame why not go to an 8 frame to begin with? Is it what you have or is there some other advantage of a 10 frame?

My are 1/4 in plywood cut to the size of my frames (deep, med or shallow) and placed in the #1 and #10 position. That it gives the hive better air circulation in winter (less condensation close to the bees)and the queen will lay closer to them than she would the hive body wall in the summer.IMHO

"Tell me and I'll forget,show me and I may remember,involve me and I'll understand" Chinese Proverb

"The farmer is the only man in our economy who buys everything at retail, sells everything at wholesale, and pays the freight both ways." John F. KennedyFranklin County Beekeepers Association MA. http://www.franklinmabeekeepers.org/

1) You get a double wall on the outside edges which cuts down on condensation and keeps them warmer.2) You can remove a follower more easily than a comb covered in bees (the follower is smoother and seldom has bees on both sides of it.

The concept is to have a 3/8" gap on each side of the follower (a beespace) so that it is easily removed without rolling bees.

As far as the "square" concept, I think square is nice, but since it's not standard and a square Langstroth would be bigger than the cluster, the eight frame works fine. The easy way for bees to move is with the gaps between the frames. The difficult way in winter is from "frame to frame". You've eliminated some of the "frame to frame" movement in the eight frame box.

If I use 8 frame boxer it will end up to bee 7 frame and 2 follower boards per box ..

BEE HAPPY Jim 134 :)

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"Tell me and I'll forget,show me and I may remember,involve me and I'll understand" Chinese Proverb

"The farmer is the only man in our economy who buys everything at retail, sells everything at wholesale, and pays the freight both ways." John F. KennedyFranklin County Beekeepers Association MA. http://www.franklinmabeekeepers.org/

When I was young and ambitious, I examined my two year old queen colonies every 9 days and crushed queen cells to keep them from swarming. I think it worked, that and making really sure they had lots of room. I would take a couple frames of brood away from them and give them foundation to build right in the heart of the brood chamber. I didn't lose many swarms. But some bees seem intent on swarming no matter what and they always seemed to get it done.

The bees will also build burr comb between the boxes where they will raise drone brood and store honey. Usually towards the end of summer,early fall after harvest I let them fill these gaps for storage and as a bridge for the cluster to move between the boxes without having to crawl over open space.You can clean out the empty burr comb in spring.

Acebird i have 8 frame equipment. The bees will go up quicker in 8 frame then 10 frame because they arent as wide obviously. They are great for cut comb honey because the bees go up faster and draw out the frames without having to move frames around. The less room the better for the bees the hives will retain more heat from the cluster.

The less room the better for the bees the hives will retain more heat from the cluster.

I guess that assumes that the cluster is the same size. You would think that a bigger hive with more stores would support a larger cluster. If that is the case than in may be warmer in the bigger hive. Anyways I have 8 frame equipment and I will be sticking with it. I hope to have two hives next season so maybe I will try the follower boards in one of them. Are these follower boards used just in the winter or all the time?